High-Tech System Monitors Salmon

Deep in Idaho’s backcountry, an $8,000 system of video cameras, hardware and electronics is helping keep track of migrating steelhead and salmon to spawning areas.

It’s an automatic remote system, with electricity provided by solar panels, monitoring fish in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness without requiring a number of humans on hand.

The system was developed by Fish and Game biologist Terry Holubetz and technician Brian Leth. The outpost is maintained by Tony Wright of Running Creek Ranch. He spends a few minutes each day making sure the system is working properly.

He changes the video tape every four to five days and checks a downstream migrant trap near a weir to count, measure and tag juvenile salmon and steelhead.

The system electronically records every fish over 10 inches moving up the stream day or night. The array of sensors, video camera and infrared lights ignores sticks and pine cones.

The long-term goal of the study is to measure high-quality habitat that could produce young salmon and steelhead.